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5 months

Friday, October 19, 2012

Every day I feel like I’m learning and growing as a mother.

Parker challenges me, makes me laugh, forces me to be patient, and teaches me to stay in the moment. She’s growing and thriving because of me and, at the same time, I can already tell she’ll be her own person in spite of me.

She smiles all the time. It’s infectious and I hope she does that every day of her life. I hope she has a great sense of humor and a quick wit.

Of course I admire those women who are willing and able to breastfeed much longer than required. If I’m honest, I don’t think I’m one of them. I don’t enjoy it like I know some mothers do. Don’t get me wrong: Feeding another person from my body is a cool superpower. I feel very fortunate to be able to do it when so many mothers can’t. But it is time and energy consuming, and it adds just one more thing to think about to my already overloaded brain. I’m doing it for her for as long as we can make it happen but I’ll be glad when it’s over, I think.

So many women feel the need to broadcast that they’ve been exclusively breastfeeding for 6, 12 or 18 months. These are the same mothers who tell anyone who will listen about their all-natural childbirth. Guess what ladies: that stuff doesn’t earn you a gold medal. It makes you look smug and self-righteous. I admire your resolve but my situation is different. Respect that before you get all judge-y.

We’re traveling to Atlanta next month to introduce Parker to the family there. My grandmother is planning a huge family dinner and is thanking The Biscuit for bringing us all together.

After Atlanta, the three of us are taking a trip to Puerto Rico for some much-needed downtime. We don’t need passports to travel there but she’s already got hers for our next international adventure.